Report finds Los Angeles and San Fransisco on par with third world countries

Recent investigations into the ever-worsening living conditions have found that liberal California is home to some of the "filthiest slums" in the world.

Californian cities Los Angeles and San Fransisco have been found to be so dirty, that conditions, in some areas, are worse than third world countries such as Kenya or India.

According to one investigation earlier this year by NBC, large areas of California's fourth-largest city SF, are covered in feces and hypodermic needles, with hospitals reporting they are struggling to cope with the influx of patients that have fallen ill as a result of the contamination from living conditions more typical in developing nations, rather than a so-called first-world state.

The problem of human feces in the streets on San Fran has gotten so bad, that the city has introduced a "poop patrol" tasked with trying to clean up the mess.

The San Fransisco Mayor London Breed has come under fire following reports that the streets are "overflowing," and citizens are "drowning," in human waste.

In another attempt to tackle the problem, Breed has devised a "brilliant" new plan to deal with the thousands of pounds of feces that engulf her city's streets that involved paying homeless people to clean up their own feces after they defecate on the sidewalks.

Mrs. Breed's plans faced harsh criticism after it was revealed that taxpayers dollars would be used to pay homeless to pick up their own poop, running into the millions of dollars.

Now, the latest investigation has found that things aren't much better in Cali's largest city Los Angeles, either.

A report found that streets were overwhelmed with human waste, trash, and rats, creating a breeding ground that's fueling diseases such as Typhus to spread in the slums and surrounding areas.

A combination of homeless encampments, wholesale fish distributors, and produce warehouses that line Ceres Avenue in downtown LA, is creating perfect conditions for rats.

Uneaten food is left to rot on the street, the sidewalks are swimming in feces, and discarded clothing piles make ideal rats' nests.

San Fransisco has been declared one of the filthiest slums in the world

According to NBC News, those rats, experts say, are likely contributing to the growing number of typhus infections cropping up on skid row and other parts of the region.

The disease is spread by fleas, which are carried by rats, opossums, and pets.

"You have constant activity that serves as a breeding ground for rats," said Estela Lopez, executive director of the Central City East Association, a business improvement district that overlaps skid row.

Los Angeles County's typhus outbreak, which began in the summer, has expanded to as many as 92 cases, including 20 in Pasadena and a possible 18 in Long Beach, where five were still under investigation by the Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services.

The average number of typhus cases the county sees in a year is 60, which itself has doubled in recent years, according to the Los Angeles County Health Department.

"With increased rat density, diseases like typhus are very likely to occur," said Dr. Lee W. Riley, an infectious disease researcher at the University of California, Berkeley.

A typhus infection can cause high fever, headache, chills and, in rare cases, meningitis and death.

It's contracted when "the feces from infected fleas are rubbed into cuts or scrapes in the skin or rubbed into the eyes," the county health department says on its website.

"We're deploying every available resource to help control and stop this outbreak," said Alex Comisar, spokesman for Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

"The city and county have formed a dedicated task force ... and we’re putting new funding into intensifying cleanups in the affected area so that we can keep our streets and sidewalks safe for everyone."

The station reported that despite 2,200 calls to a city helpline in the last two years by people requesting trash pickup in the area, the city responded to less than half the complaints.

It's a situation Garcetti called "disgusting and it's unacceptable."

Los Angeles County Supervisors Kathryn Barger and Janice Hahn are expected to introduce a motion Tuesday that would create the Housing for Public Health program, a coordinated effort to reduce the spread of typhus and other diseases on skid row by cleaning, housing and educating the homeless.

Barger and Hahn introduced a motion last week to "seek flea collar donations that can be distributed to homeless individuals that have pets."

Lopez, of the Central City East Association, said "illegally dumping, food being discarded, accumulation of blankets and pillows, and human waste" is creating "Third World conditions."

Parts of Los Angeles are on par with third-world countries such as India or Kenya

At the Midnight Mission, which serves three meals a day to as many as 1,000 people, the scene outside its doors can be chaotic.

"If you walk out of our building, you’re faced with the threat of assault, drug dealing, and trash everywhere," said Georgia Berkovich, the nonprofit's director of public affairs.

Jerry Jones, public policy director at the Inner City Law Center, called the squalor and inhumanity on the streets "shocking" and "surreal."

"There’s definitely an abundance of rats and roaches and horrible conditions," he said.

Social service providers say the county and city could reduce human waste by installing more 24-hour public bathrooms in an area that has only two.

They also blame charities for handing out food and clothing that ends up being dumped on the spot, attracting rats.

On Saturday, nearly a dozen people from a local church handed out food on Ceres Avenue, which KNBC identified as a hot spot for rats.

Volunteer Karina Dominguez-Gonzalez said the nondenominational group was careful to hand out only peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches in paper bags to those who asked.

She said she's seen other organizations put boxes of food "on the sidewalk like people are going to rush in like animals."

In response to rats, trash and typhus, Garcetti recently dedicated another $300,000 to fortifying trash pickup, sidewalk washing and street cleaning in the skid row neighborhood that's home to an estimated 2,145 people living outdoors.

Each street in the area is visited by cleanup crews once every two weeks under the six-year-old Operation Healthy Streets initiative, according to Garcetti's office.

But because of the typhus outbreak, the cleanups have been expanded from a nine-block area to 25 blocks, city officials said.

In 2012, the rats' nests, human waste, and hypodermic needles got so bad on skid row that county health officials cited the city for health code violations and filthy conditions that the county later said contributed to a Hepatitis A outbreak.

The city responded by launching Operation Healthy Streets, but since then homelessness has exploded, increasing 47 percent from 2012, according to data from the county Homeless Services Authority.